Insanity's encor

Serika clutched Yuni tightly in her arms as the two flew through the portal. A few seconds later, they found themselves flying towards a lake, landing with a mighty splash. Despite that, Serika maintained her hold on Yuni and managed to swim over to the shore while still carrying her.

"You better not have inhaled a shit ton of water," Serika glared as she set Yuni down.

"Nope, I'm good. But that really took the wind out of me. Do you know where we are?" Yuni asked as she slowly turned her head.

"No clue, but it sure as hell ain't Stream festivalen. Or maybe it is."

"I doubt it. Madoka wouldn't hide something like this."

Serika attempted to use her phone, but much to her dismay, there was no signal. The same was true for Yuni's phone causing the two to change their gameplan. Since things didn't look too hostile, the two decided to set up camp and dry off their clothes. As they were doing so, a portal opened up in the sky, and a figure came hurdling down into the lake with a splash.

Yuni and Serika went on guard, but relaxed as soon as they recognized the figure that emerged from the water.

"Ugh, I lost my fake eyelashes. Hope my spares didn't wash away," Astrid sighed as she reached into her soggy jacket pockets.

"You're Astrid, right?" Yuni asked.

"One and only," Astrid smiled as she pulled out her makeup kit.

"I never knew your eyelashes were fake."

"Yup, been fake ever since my high school days actually. See my dumbass self decided to pluck em all out and laser em to see what would happen, and well they never grew back since."

"Then why are you wearing fake eyelashes?"

"Uh, cuz eyelashes help keep shit out of your eyes, dumbass," Serika growled.

"I meant why is she wearing them if her whole shtick is being the bald queen."

"Heh, the green-haired one's got it right. I wear em mainly to keep crap out of my eyes, but I also kind of like the look a bit better. Besides, the eyelashes are fake anyway so I'm still Miss Totally hairless. Anyway, we doing a nude campsite vid or something?"

"More like drying off our clothes. So you have any idea where this is?"

Astrid didn't seem to have a clue either, nor was she made aware of any plans for something like this beforehand. As she began to undress, the portal once again opened and someone new fell into the lake. This time it ended up being Carol.

"You're Cece, right?" Astrid asked.

"Yup! We on stream?" Carol asked.

"No, in fact this is entirely off script.

A worried expression overtook Carol as she darted her head around. She then pulled out her phone, but like the others, had no signal, leading to her to pull out her WWCF card. This led to her having to explain to the others what it was before checking to see if she could challenge anyone.

"Hmm, I got nothing. Welp, guess I'll just strip," Carol shrugged as she did so.

Once that was done, she huddled together with the others as they sat around the fire. "Talk about yuri. So anyone wanna play truth or grope?"

"Touch my tits and I kill you," Serika snarled.

"Just joking."

"Oh, and don't grope Yuni's either or I kill you."

"She your girlfriend?"

"No, she's my little sister."

You two look pretty different, especially your eyes, though I guess your highlights match her hair color.

"We have the same mother, though our circumstances growing up were far different from each other. In fact, we didn't even know we were sisters until last year," Yuni sighed.

Sensing she might have hit a sensitive spot, Carol apologized immediately.

"Wow, for one of Ewetube's most anti-family-friendly residents, you sure have a lot of humility," Astrid chuckled.

"I just figured I might be intruding on a sensitive topic."

Everyone went silent and sat as the fire crackled on. Carol's normally cheery demeanor had been dampened a bit while Serika had also begun to clam up a bit too. Astrid decided to break the silence by asking if any of the three had ever shaved their heads. It started off well with Carol enthusiastically exclaiming she had, but Yuni quickly began to tremble in terror at the mere mention of it.

This once again led to an apology and more awkward silence. It seemed like it would take the arrival of someone else to clear things up. Unfortunately, the one that showed up was one of the hooded figures.

Everyone went on guard as the figure stood menacingly in the sky before suddenly throwing off their cloak, revealing themself to be a skeleton clad in Viking attire.

Astrid's eyes widened as she recognized the skeleton. "J- Julius!?"

Julius was the main antagonist of the cult classic video game, Nonexistent light: Insanity's ballad. Astrid was all too familiar with Julius due to holding a legendary high-production stream where she and Leona streamed the final route of the game. There, fellow streamer, Jaime359, was drafted to cosplay as Julius and run around the area before eventually getting defeated with a lariat to the face.

"Uh Jaime, is this a prank?" Astrid nervously asked.

"'Jaime'!? I'm Julius!" the skeleton scoffed as he landed atop the water.

"You sound just like him though."

"HE imitated me! In fact I plan to kill him for his slanderous portrayal of me! How dare he project that a mere lariat would kill me!"

"But didn't you die at the end of the game?"

"NO! My death was just the beginning!"

"So why are you here?"

"Because I swore allegiance to lord Mukbang!"

Astrid scowled in confusion as "Mukbang" was not the name of any of the eldritch gods from Insanity's ballad. Plus, she knew what a mukbang was, which only added to the confusion. "So, you swore allegiance to a guy that eats a lot?"

"YES! Now, let the insanity consume you!"

Julius raised his hand as Astrid frantically dived on top of the others. "Don't look! He- AAAAAH!"

Astrid recoiled in horror as she realized everyone had been reduced to rotting corpses. However, she quickly punched her head as hard as she could, breaking free of the illusion. She then noticed everyone else was on the ground screaming in terror as Julius' insanity gripped them.

"NOO! DON'T KILL OKAA-SAN! YOU MONSTERS!" Yuni cried as she rolled around screaming.

"GO BACK TO HELL YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT!" Serika shouted as she frantically swung at the air.

"IT WAS JUST A JOKE! NO MORE! NO MORE!" Carol cried as she huddled up in a ball on the ground.

Astrid took a deep breath and stroked her head for good luck before charging towards Yuni and squeezing her cheeks together. "PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER! IT'S AN ILLUSION!"

"Huh?"

Yuni blinked as she realized Astrid was right. She then noticed Serika swinging at the air and dove towards her legs. "ONEE-SAN! SNAP OUT OF IT!"

Yuni's shouting managed to break Serika free, causing her to stand stunned for a moment before shooting a murderous glare at Julius. "You undead piece of shit. I'LL KILL YOU FOR MAKING ME RELIVE THAT HELL!"

As she charged towards Julius, Astrid quickly stopped her.

"OUTTA THE WAY!"

"NO! We can't beat him like this! We gotta run!"

"Where?"

"How about that town in the distance?"

"You sure that's even real?"

Astrid let loose a confident smirk. "Oh it's real alright. In fact, it's straight out of Insanity's ballad."

"Insanity's what?"

"HEY! Stop spoiling my game!" Julius shouted as he pulled out a bony spear.

"Time to run!"

Serika quickly scooped up Yuni and Carol as Astrid grabbed all the clothes before they all made a dash for it. Julius meanwhile refused to pursue and instead sunk into the lake.

"Fools! That town is not from my game! I merely made it look like it from a distance. Oh, and they just had to run there naked. I do believe the traders hide along the routes there too. Oh, poor girls."

"Nguuuuuuuh'

Julius turned to notice a hooded figure floating behind him. "Sorry my friend, but you dove up a bit too late. Though I guess you can pursue them."

The figure responded with an affirming moan and rose out of the water before floating after the girls.